Ever the Same
by Sandtigress
Summary: Not even destruction could keep this pair of star-crossed lovers apart. Epilogue for ME3EC


_Many many thanks to BlameTheTemplar and SurelyForth for being my creative sounding boards!_

"Major Alenko?" Specialist Traynor's voice broke through the haze of inattention he always seemed to find himself in lately. S_nap out of it, __Alenko. You've done this before_, he reminded himself for the millionth time. _It's not how she'd want you to keep going_.

"Sorry," he answered, giving himself another mental shake. "Go ahead."

She gave him a long concerned look before continuing. "I was saying that we finally passed by a working comm buoy. A number of messages came through and there's a few for you. One of them is from Admiral Hackett, flagged high priority."

"Thanks Traynor. I'll take it in my room," he answered with a grateful nod. Maybe it would be something they could do, instead of endlessly flying around the galaxy. He needed something to occupy his thoughts. Something _else_.

Kaidan could feel her eyes on him as he walked over to the elevator. She was worried about him. They all were, always coming to "see how he was doing" or "just to chat". It was nice knowing they all cared, but it was all too much. They had all loved her, but not like he had. Right now, he just wanted some space, some time to be alone with his memories of her, while they were still fresh, before he started to forget. He knew from experience that whether he wanted them to or not, after a few years those little details would begin to fade away.

He took the elevator down, not up. It would have been well within his rights as the ranking officer on the ship to have claimed Shepard's quarters and everyone seemed to expect it. But he couldn't. It smelled like her and still had her clothes and her weird little models and the fish she obsessed, _had_ obsessed over. He wanted the memories, but not that close, not just yet.

For now, he had decided to stay where he had been in the observation deck, even though that meant seeing that monument with her name on it each time he came or went. _Commander Shepard_. He closed his eyes or turned away every time, not wanting or needing the reminder that she was gone.

It was neutral enough space otherwise, given how much the Normandy had been and always would be hers. His one major concession to being the ship's captain had been to enter Shepard's cabin long enough to commandeer her private terminal for his own use, little as that was with most of the communications networks still down from the Crucible blast. Then he'd had to set up a completely different profile to use because all he saw were messages to and from her and he almost couldn't take it.

So now he sat at a terminal scrubbed clean of her, opening up his new messages. None of the ones he expected to see, a response from his mom or his students. The messages he had sent probably hadn't gone out. He spotted the one Traynor had mentioned, a message from Admiral Hackett, marked high priority. _We found her_ the subject line read. Kaidan's heart stopped. Hackett couldn't mean who he hoped he meant or if he did, not alive. No one could have survived the Citadel, as damaged as it had been when they had left. Even if she had survived the blast, not even Shepard could survive the exposure to open space. She hadn't before.

He opened the message with shaking hands, unable to kill that little spark of hope that flared in his heart against all odds.

_Major,_

_As you know, we're working our way through all the unidentified wounded and dead on earth. The Reapers did a number on our forces, not to mention the civilian population. We have our work cut out for us._

_We got reports of an N7 soldier that they pulled out of the London rubble. Female and a biotic. I confirmed it with my own eyes. We have Commander Shepard. She's alive but in critical condition. The doctors aren't giving her good odds, but you and I know Shepard. Get to London, St. Bart's Hospital. _

_Hackett_

Shepard. Alive. It was impossible, but it was true. Maybe they had mis-identified…but Hackett had confirmed it himself. Hackett would know. It was her. He spent a few moments just trying to remember how to breathe. Frantically, he checked the date on the message. Four months ago, a few weeks after the final push for earth. Shepard could be dead by now. The buoys hadn't passed on any more messages, which meant nothing given how badly damaged the comm systems were.

Four months. Four months spent throwing himself into repairing the Normandy trying to bury how badly it hurt to lose her again while desperately clinging to the memories. Four months she might be or might have been waiting for him while he dithered about returning to earth because he wasn't sure he could face going back to the place where he'd lost her a second time. Those months, wasted.

He slammed a fist into the table in frustration then swung out of his chair to hit the intercom button. "Joker! Get us back to earth, _now_!"

-~0~-

Cortez looked out the door briefly and seeing no doctors, pulled out a greasy paper bag and handed it over. "Here," he said with a grin. "I thought you might be getting tired of hospital food."

Shepard took the package gratefully and tore it open as best she could with bandaged hands to take a bite of the contents as Cortez shifted the pillows behind her to help her sit up. "Thanks Steve. I have no idea what it is, but this might be the best tasting thing I have ever had."

The shuttle pilot laughed. "I don't know what it is either. The food in London isn't like anything I've ever seen before. Probably best not to ask too many questions." He settled into a chair next to her bedside. "So really? How are you holding up?"

Shepard started to shrug as she swallowed another mouthful then thought better of it at the twinge of pain that followed from a dozen still-healing wounds. "Better than I expected? Especially since no one will tell me what the hell is going on. I don't even know how long I've been here. Or how I got here for that matter."

Cortez looked pensive for a moment. "I guess we're all just happy you're back with us. Don't want to say anything that would mess that up." He sighed. "What do you…"

"Why don't you let me handle the questions, lieutenant?" Cortez jumped out of his seat to salute as Admiral Hackett entered her room.

"Yes sir," the pilot replied. "Shepard, I'll come see you later, okay? Hang in there." He gave her an encouraging smile before leaving the room.

"Admiral Hackett," Shepard greeted him with a nod. "It's good to see you, sir. I'd salute but…" She indicated bandaged arms and hands in mute testimony.

"That's not necessary," Hackett replied. "I should probably be saluting you instead. We only beat the Reapers because of you."

"So we did it? It worked?" Shepard asked. There had always been that slight fear in the back of her mind that it wouldn't, that somehow the child that called itself the Catalyst had lied to her and that it had all been for nothing. That one of the things they weren't telling her was that she had failed and the war was still raging on. It was a relief to hear that she hadn't.

The admiral nodded. "It did. The Reapers are gone, from every star system we've received reports from. And they're cheering your name in every one of those systems." She nodded gratefully, leaning further back in her bed and closing her eyes for a moment as a wave of exhaustion followed the relief. This was the longest she had been awake in a while. Hackett noted the shift with a frown. "Shepard, I can come back later. You deserve some rest."

She shook her head at once then winced at the pain that followed. "No, I want answers." She needed answers.

Hackett nodded in reply. "What do you want to know?"

"What happened after I destroyed the Crucible?" she asked immediately.

"We were hoping you could tell us," he answered. "What we saw was a red explosion from the Crucible. It hit everything, jumped from relay to relay. The Reaper forces dropped like flies when it hit them. Allied forces on the ground were left mostly intact though we lost a number of ships that failed mid-jump."

There was something he wasn't telling her, though it wasn't as though she needed to be told. "We lost the Normandy," she said. It wasn't phrased as a question because she already knew the answer.

Hackett watched her for a moment before confirming. "She never arrived at the rendezvous site. We're still finding ships that rerouted and made it past the blast but…"

"But after this long, there's not much hope," Shepard finished. It only confirmed what she already knew. She had still been mostly out these past few days, but her squad, her friends would never have stayed away this long if they had known she was alive. Kaidan never would have stayed away this long.

"We've sent messages, but the comm networks are so damaged there's no telling if anything got out." He sighed. "This isn't how we wanted to tell you, Shepard. I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news."

"No, that's okay," she replied. She was glad the effort it took to get the words out didn't show. "I needed to know. What are our other casualties?"

Hackett seemed more comfortable now that he could go back into straight military strategist mode. "All the Allied forces suffered fairly severe losses, but we lost fewer than we might have thanks to you. The geth were hit the hardest. We're not sure that any of them survived and we don't know why. The blast seemed to have the same effect on them as on the Reapers and our tech."

"The geth?" Shepard whispered, horrified. When the Catalyst had told her that all synthetics would be destroyed, she had never expected the geth to be included in that. Her decision had resulted in the destruction of an entire race of sapient creatures, synthetic though they might have been.

The admiral raised an eyebrow. "Do you know what happened?"

"The Catalyst gave me a choice," she said, feeling numb. This wasn't what she had wanted. "On the Citadel. I met something, an AI, that told me it was the actual Catalyst, not the Citadel itself," she explained at Hackett's questioning look. "It said that the Reapers were its solution to conflict between organics and synthetics and it gave me a choice, a way to end the war. I chose to destroy the Reapers. But the geth…"

"I see." The admiral looked thoughtful for a moment before nodding decisively. "Thank you for the information, commander. We'll talk more about this later. Right now, you need to get some rest. And finish your lunch," he ordered, indicating her illicit meal, lying forgotten on her lap. "The galaxy wants you back on your feet as soon as possible."

She nodded dully, the reply automatic. "Yes sir." She didn't really want to eat anymore, her appetite gone with the death of any hope that the Normandy might have been sent out on mission or any other reason that would explain their absence and with the news of the eradication of the geth. She did try though, more out of a sense of duty than anything else after Admiral Hackett left, until the growing pain of her still healing body matched all the grief and made eating impossible. At least the physical pain could be relieved when the doctor came to fill her veins with drugs again. The heartache didn't have so easy a solution.

Cortez showed up shortly after she woke the next day. He filled the quiet of the room with light-hearted banter and stories about the rebuilding of Earth, but Shepard wasn't fooled. He was there to watch her, to make sure she was dealing with the deaths of her squad as well as the geth. Everyone around her was trying their hardest to shelter her from everything and she was getting fed up with it.

"Steve, _stop_," she finally cut in when he stopped to take a breath. "Just…stop. You don't need to treat me like some fragile child. I'll be okay. Not today maybe but…eventually."

He blinked for a moment in surprise before a sad smile formed on his face. "Sorry Shepard. I just remember how bad it was with Robert and I…what do you really want to talk about?"

Satisfied that he wasn't going to keep babying her, Shepard settled back more comfortably in her bed. "Fill me in on my past couple of weeks. How long have I been out?"

"It's been four months, Shepard," Cortez answered.

Shepard blinked in surprise. "Four months?" she repeated. She knew it had been awhile, but that was far longer than she had expected.

"Yeah, you were in pretty rough shape when they dragged you out of the rubble. Lacerations, severe burns, broken bones, infection, blood loss, the works." The shuttle paused for a moment, rubbing a hand over his short cut hair. "To be honest, the docs didn't think you were going to make it."

She laughed, at least as much as her healing body would allow. "I've heard that one before. Multiple times."

"They kept you in a medical coma for most of that time to let you heal up some, and then you were in and out for another week or so when they woke you up," Cortez continued. "Docs were gonna give up when they found you but said they would keep trying since you kept fighting. That's when the Alliance got word and came in. We had no idea you were still alive before that. Everyone was sure you had died on the Citadel."

"I thought I had too," Shepard replied. "You said they pulled me out of the rubble? Where? On Earth?"

He nodded. "Right about where the beam that was sending people to the Citadel was. You don't know how you ended up there?"

"No idea," she answered. "I guess maybe the Catalyst sent me back down after I destroyed the Crucible? I really don't know."

"Well, either way, we're glad to have you back, Shepard," Cortez told her. "After losing Anderson and…"

"And the Normandy," she finished when it was clear he wasn't going to do so himself. "It's okay, you can say it."

"And the Normandy," he repeated reluctantly. "Well, we all needed a little bit of good news about then. Glad it was you." He eyed her critically for a moment. "Look, Shepard, are you sure you're okay? I know how close you were to the crew, how close you were to…"

She cut him off before he could say Kaidan's name. "I'll have to be, won't I? There's no changing that they're gone." Shepard brought one hand up to very gingerly rub at her temples where a headache was beginning to form. "I'm not going to say it doesn't hurt like hell, Steve. I'm the one who told them to leave. Maybe they'd still be alive if I'd let them stay on earth. I don't know. But I'm never going to know the answer to that."

Cortez reached out to pat her hand gently. "I get it. Just know I'm here for you when you need me, okay?"

"Thanks Steve," Shepard answered with a smile. "I'm glad you made it at least. It's good to have a friend here."

"Likewise, ma'am," the pilot replied. "It was rough thinking I might be the only survivor of the Normandy for a while. She was a good ship."

"The best. I've never been sorrier to miss a flight. Don't look at me like that, Cortez," she sighed when his eyes narrowed at the comment. "I'm alive and I'm going to stay that way. It's just going to be hard going on without them." Without _him_. But even as she said it, she was glad. Better this than to know that Kaidan had to go on without her for a second time. It was her turn to mourn him now, to bear that pain. And she knew she would for a long, long time to come.

-~0~-

"Shepard, you've got to slow down," Cortez cautioned as he helped ease her back onto her bed after leaning her crutches against the wall. "You're gonna hurt yourself if you keep pushing so hard."

"They don't call it 'intensive therapy' for nothing, Steve," Shepard replied. "It's fine, I know what I'm doing." And she did. She was working hard enough to exhaust herself to sleep at night because if she did she could forget how empty her bed was. She focused on the training because then she could stop thinking for a short while about how many friends she had lost in a war that everyone else called an unmitigated victory. It was better to do that than to lie in bed and think, and the only thing they allowed her to do right now was therapy. So therapy it was.

Cortez leaned in with a hand on her shoulder. "I know what you're doing, Shepard. I'm not an idiot." He caught her eyes, his dark eyes gravely serious. "Kaidan wouldn't want you to work yourself to death like this."

She sighed. "I'm not trying to hurt myself, Steve. But I can't lay here in bed and do _nothing_ all day. And they won't let me do anything else."

Cortez watched her thoughtfully for a moment then nodded. "Okay. What do you say we get out of here for a little while? Some fresh air would do you good."

"That sounds _great_," she answered, reaching for her crutches again. Cortez grabbed them first and put them out of her reach, going for her wheelchair instead.

"Humor me, commander," he said when she scowled at him. "For old times' sake, let me be your pilot again."

That earned a genuine laugh. "Alright, for old times' sake," she agreed, allowing him to help her out of bed again and down into her chair.

Being out in the sunlight and open air for the first time in the two months since she had awakened did wonders for her spirits. She hadn't yet seen Earth since the Reapers' destruction. In the bright light of day, without the smoke and flames, London seemed to her to be one of the most beautiful places she had ever seen, even though it was still largely rubble. There was evidence everywhere, in bits and pieces, of people beginning to rebuild, beginning to put their lives back together. It would have been easy to despair at the extent of the devastation, but Shepard chose optimism instead. At least they all had the chance to move forward. They had life, and with life came hope.

It was wonderfully relaxing to be in the sunlight and Shepard leaned back in her chair, letting the bright warmth fall on her face. She stayed like that for a time until a shadow passed over, blocking the light. Shepard cracked an eye open to see what the disturbance might be, expecting to see that they had crossed into the shade of a high-rise that had survived the Reapers' assault. Suddenly it felt like her heart had forgotten how to beat.

Cortez noted the change immediately and stopped. "Shepard, what's wrong?" he asked, concerned. "Do we need to go back to the hospital?"

"No!" she near-shouted at him. She tried to get a second look, but the fleeting shape was already out of sight. "Is there a spaceport nearby?"

He looked at her, uncomprehending. "What?"

"A spaceport, a landing strip, somewhere a frigate could land!" She looked about wildly though it would be near-impossible to see anything suitable from the ground level, Cortez's hands the only thing keeping her from rising from her chair.

The pilot moved around to face her directly. "Shepard, what's going on?"

"That was the Normandy," she explained, her heart beating wildly now. She looked around, but the elusive ship did not reappear. "That was her, I know it."

Cortez frowned. "Shepard, I understand wanting to hope, but…"

She grabbed him by the front of his shirt. "Do you honestly think I wouldn't recognize my own ship? It was the Normandy, no doubts."

"Maybe coming out here was a bad idea," Cortez said doubtfully, carefully freeing her hands from his shirt. "We should get you back inside." He made as though he were going to go back around to steer her back into the hospital.

Shepard grabbed his arm first. "Damn you, Cortez, I know what I saw. If you don't help me get to the nearest spaceport, I will find a way to get there myself."

"You really would, wouldn't you?" Cortez shook his head and sighed. "Alright, we'll go. I just…Shepard, I don't want you to be disappointed when you find out it's not her."

"I won't be," she said confidently. There was no doubt in her mind that it had been the Normandy. Her ship. Her crew.

It turned out there was a spaceport only a few blocks away from the hospital. They made the journey in silence, Cortez no doubt dreading her reaction when she discovered she had been mistaken on the frigate's identity. Shepard fretted in her seat, barely containing the anticipation of seeing her squad, her team, her friends again. Of seeing Kaidan again. Then apprehension would set in, wondering who would not be there, who had fallen to the Reapers. What if, after all of this, she had still lost him?

"I don't believe it," Cortez whispered as they moved within sight of the landing zone. "You were right."

Satisfaction turned to doubt as a thought occurred to her. "Steve, what if he sees me and…" She stopped, unable to finish the question. The war with the Reapers had left their mark. She'd seen the scars in the mirror, once they dared let her have one, from the burns and the multiple surgeries required to save her life. With time and modern technology most of those scars would likely fade away and she wasn't a vain person. But now, still marked and healing with her hair shorter and more ragged than she'd ever worn it in their time together…

Cortez laughed in disbelief. "Really? Are we talking about the same man? Shepard, he's going to take one look at you and…"

Whatever the pilot was going to say was made moot when a figure emerged from the Normandy's open airlock and they caught sight of one another. Cortez moved to help her out of her chair when she half-jumped to her feet and then Kaidan had caught her in his arms and they were on their knees, tangled up in laughter and it didn't matter to her that their mingled tears of joy stung across her face because he was actually _there_.

"You're alive," he whispered in disbelief, framing her face in his hands, like he needed to make sure his eyes weren't playing tricks on him. "I thought I'd lost you for good."

"Likewise, major," she replied huskily. He was really there. She could feel the warmth of his skin, the stubble on his cheek. This was real.

"Shepard, we shouldn't have left you," he began, the guilt and sorrow clear in his voice and in his eyes. "All these months, I should have been here…"

"Kaidan!" she cut him off before he could really get started. She cupped his chin when he broke off his litany of apology in confusion and looked him straight in the eye. "Shut up and kiss me."

He laughed that breathy laugh that she'd thought she'd never hear again. "Yes ma'am," he answered before proceeding to make good on his word, pulling her close to bring his lips to her own. It didn't matter that the press of their bodies hurt, she needed it to go on forever.

"That's it. I'm calling it. Shepard's immortal." Joker's voice broke their reverie, reminding them that their reunion had, by now, quite the audience. They pulled back from each other with wry smiles – somehow Joker always managed to interrupt their little moments.

"It's good to see you too, Joker," Shepard laughed, shaking her head. It was hard to believe she wasn't dreaming or imagining it all.

The reunions went on around them, James greeting Cortez with a joyous "Esteban!" and hugs and backslaps going around. But Shepard and Kaidan had eyes only for each other.

"Never again," he murmured as he pulled her close again. "You're not going to leave me behind ever again."

"Is that an order, major?" she asked, her lips brushing against his.

She felt rather than saw his smile. "You better believe it," he answered before claiming her for another kiss. This had to be the way it was meant to be. Together, forever, ever the same.


End file.
